Archive for September 22nd, 2010

We’re on a new! improved! totally Draconian! budget to save for some life-goal type stuff, brought to you by the letter S for Screwed and F for Florida and let’s just throw in H for House!, and I think I’ve mentioned this before, but the truth is, I love budgeting, and I say that with as much enthusiasm as I can muster. In my head, it kind of sounds like Plex from Yo Gabba Gabba. “I’m thinking of a budget! It’s flexible and painful!”

I! Love! TO BUDGET!

And of COURSE I love to budget. Budgeting is fun! Budgeting makes it seem like you have all! this! extra! money! Assuming, of course, that you stick to it, tracking every blasted cent and this — this is where things usually go horribly awry, and it’s kind of like being on a diet, where suddenly you want to run right out and eat an entire chocolate cake, then spend the entirety of your bank account on hookers and blow. HOOKERS AND BLOW! And maybe a pizza or some new jeans. Or a pedicure. Man, I would love a pedicure, but under the new regime, I’d have to save and account for said pedicure and decide if I want the pedicure or something else with my allotted monthly fun money and OH BLERGH, the growing bank account is satisfying, but I’m not sure it’s as satisfying as sitting in a spa chair, you know what I’m saying?

Screw responsibility, man. Sometimes adulthood blows.

At any rate, this whole hot mess is how I found myself doing things like buying a $5 toy kitchen at a yard sale, followed by (and this is really terrifying, just TERRIFYING), coming to a screeching halt in front of a house on a busy street because they had a giant kid’s easel out front marked “FREE!”

You guys, I loaded this giant, awful plastic easel into the back of my car on a busy street and it’s awful! It’s awful and large and unwieldy, and I’m not even sure what I was thinking! I just LOADED THIS BIG-ASS THING IN THE CAR AND DROVE AWAY. And it’s awful! And now *I* am going to have to be the assface who leaves it outside MY house saying, FREE TO GOOD HOME. PLEASE TAKE THIS PLASTIC MONSTROSITY AWAY FROM ME.

And let us talk about the total savings theoretically achieved by my drive-by easeling: $14. Yes, friends, the easel I’ve been meaning to get Sam is $14. Is $14 going to make or break our budget? HA HA. NO. Especially when I’ve budgeted for Sam and Sam-related items and activities, and FOR GOD’S SAKE.

This is why I tend to be an insane stop-and-start person. I go whole effing HOG on something, and the next thing you know I’m irrationally weeping into my generic K-cups about how life is UNFAAAAAIR and I’m DUMPSTER DIVING and before you can say “THROW THE EASEL!” I’m going to be like Frank and Charlie, pushing carts through the streets of Boston and hollering about how, THIS RADIO IS STILL GOOD, DAMMIT. Put a plastic bag on it and jam out in the shower! That EASEL IS STILL GOOD! PAINT! PAINT PAINT!

And then, in a fit of frustration, I’ll decide that I will … I WILL SHOW MYSELF WHO’S BOSS. And then I will have a commissioned, artist-approved easel embossed with the work of Van Gogh himself, to the tune of thousands of dollars, all for an 18-month-old who just wants to COLOR, dammit, with the COLOR OF BANANAS. THE ONE SHE WAS THINKING OF! I! LOVE! TO COLOR!

(My mind often goes Plex on me. Why? Because sometimes I find myself watching Yo Gabba Gabba ALONE. WITHOUT A CHILD. This, by the way, brings me to a tangent when a few months ago, Adam came home with a Backyardigans DVD for Sam for an upcoming car trip. Me: “The Backyardigans? We never watch the Backyardigans!” Adam: “Shut up! Of course we do! Every night!” Me: “This is because we leave Nick Jr. on after Sam goes to bed. SAM does not watch the Backyardigans. WE DO.”)

In other news, the Book Lushes are back in action, and our book this month is going to be a young adult selection. I know! YOUNG ADULT! Finally! Please join us here, and vote in the poll, which should be up by Thursday morning is now live, bishes! And then read with us! Join us! 500 people can’t be wrong! (Except that I hated our last book but that is not their fault! Apparently I have Red Tent issues!)